Sunday, November 11, 2012

The Fiscal Bump

I wish we'd stop giving away the narrative to Republicans by accepting their heavily-biased "cliff" metaphor. A grand bargain passed on January 2 would be no different than the same grand bargain passed on December 31, so it's more of a bump or a shallow ramp than a cliff; the negative effects would be cumulative rather than all at once. And a post-January-1 agreement could be made retroactive to January 1, thereby eliminating the negative effects entirely.

The only meaningful impact of waiting until after January 1 would be that Republicans would no longer have this weapon to hold the economy hostage with; they'd have to negotiate in good faith at that point.

Wednesday, November 07, 2012

The Truth about PETA

The following story is from This is True dated 17 July 2005. It is Copyright 2005 Randy Cassingham, all rights reserved, and reprinted here with permission:

"Ethical" Defined

After more than 100 dead dogs were dumped in a trash dumpster over four weeks, police in Ahoskie, N.C., kept an eye on the trash receptacle behind a supermarket. Sure enough, a van drove up and officers watched the occupants throw in heavy plastic bags. They detained the two people in the van and found 18 dead dogs in plastic bags in the dumpster, including puppies; 13 more dead dogs were still in the van. Police say the van is registered to the headquarters of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, and the two occupants, Andrew B. Cook, 24, and Adria Joy Hinkle, 27, identified themselves as PETA employees. An autopsy performed on one of the dogs found it was healthy before it was killed. Police say PETA has been picking up the animals -- alive -- from North Carolina animal shelters, promising to find them good homes. Cook and Hinkle have been charged with 62 felony counts of animal cruelty. In response to the arrests PETA President Ingrid Newkirk said it's against the group's policy for employees to dump animals in the trash, but "that for some animals in North Carolina, there is no kinder option than euthanasia." (Roanoke-Chowan News-Herald) ...Oops, my mistake: that's "Playing God" Defined.

In his author's notes section, Cassingham had more to say about this story:

The more I learn about PETA, the less I think of them. The story of them killing animals isn't even unusual. According to PETA's own filings, in 2004 PETA killed 86.3 percent of the animals entrusted to its care -- a number that's rising, not falling. Meanwhile, the SPCA in PETA's home town (Norfolk, Va.) was able to find loving homes for 73 percent of the animals put in its care. A shortage of funds? Nope: last year PETA took in $29 million in tax-exempt donations. It simply has other priorities for the funds, like funding terrorism (yes, really). But don't take my word for it: I got my figures from http://www.PETAkillsAnimals.com -- and they have copies of PETA's state and federal filings to back it up. The bottom line: if you donate money to PETA because you think they care for and about animals, you need to think some more. PETA literally yells and screams about how others "kill animals" but this is how they operate? Pathetic.

And you know what I wonder? PETA's official count of animals they kill is 86.3 percent. But if they're going around picking up animals, killing them while they drive around and not even giving them a chance to be adopted, and then destroying the evidence by dumping the bodies in the trash, are those deaths being reported? My guess: no. While 86.3 percent is awful, the actual number is probably much, much higher. How dare they lecture anyone about the "ethical" treatment of animals!

(This is True is a weekly column featuring weird-but-true news stories from around the world, and has been published since 1994. Click the link for info about free subscriptions.)

Friday, November 02, 2012

Music for the Holidays


Hank and Carol had been happily married for twenty-two years. The only friction in their marriage was Hank's habit of farting loudly every morning when he awoke. The noise would wake Carol; the smell would make her eyes water, and she'd gasp for air.

Every morning she would plead with him to stop ripping them off because it was making her sick. He told her he couldn't stop it and that it was perfectly natural. She told him to see a doctor, she was concerned that one day he would blow his guts out.

The years went by and he continued to rip them out. Then one Christmas day morning, as she was preparing the turkey for dinner and Hank was upstairs sound asleep, Carol looked at the innards, neck, gizzard, liver and all the spare parts, and a malicious thought came to her.

She took the bowl and went upstairs where her husband was sound asleep and, gently pulling the bed covers back, she pulled back the elastic waistband of his underpants and emptied the bowl of turkey guts into his shorts.


Sometime later she heard Hank awake with his usual trumpeting, followed by a blood curdling scream and the sound of frantic footsteps as Hank ran into the bathroom. Carol could hardly control herself as she rolled on the floor laughing, tears in her eyes! After years of torture she reckoned she had got him back pretty good.

About twenty minutes later, Hank came downstairs in his blood stained underpants with a look of horror on his face. Carol bit her lip as she asked him what was the matter.

Hank said, "Honey you were right. All these years you warned me and I didn't listen to you".

"What do you mean?" asked Carol.

"Well,", explained Hank, "you always told me that one day I would end up farting my guts out, and today it finally happened, but by the grace of god, some vaseline and two fingers. I think I got most of them back in!"